Envy's a coal comes hissing hot from hell.
--Philip James Bailey

A co-worker wins a grand prize in a drawing. A neighbor inherits enough money to add a room to her house and to take a great vacation. A friend's son or daughter wins a scholarship. What's our reaction? Do we automatically rejoice at someone else's good fortune? Or do we immediately sink into a pit of self-pity and resentment, having to force a smile and a word of congratulations?

Occasional flickers of envy are human and inevitable, but a chronic sense of being cheated is a sign of spiritual disorder, a sign that there's work to be done. Acceptance and gratitude are the antidotes to the misery machine of envy.

"Why not me?" in the face of another's windfall may just as logically be asked in the face of another's tragedy. Let us have the wisdom to accept our lives as they are and to be less blind to the advantages we already have.

Today, I am grateful for what I have and gracious about what other people have.